to be shocked that SIL and her kids only bath / shower once a week?

[emilytankengine]

I have a shower every day, before work, sometimes twice if I've been to the gym or if we're on holiday / going out. I probably make sure the younger kids get a bath about 5 times a week and my teenage daughter has a shower every day.

SIL was outraged at this and says that she only typically has a bath or a shower once a week! She says that she has a wash every day with a face cloth (including her bottom :O - with a face cloth!!).

Maybe it's me who's odd but I was staggered at this

[ragged]

Is this still going? FFS, how much is there to say in astonishment about other people's hygiene habits?

[d0gFace]

Ive always found I tend to smell stale if my clothes havent been dryed properly and they have like a musty damp smell to them.

The thing with people on trains ect they could shower everyday and still smell.

[AllieZ]

I shower once in the morning when getting up; once before going to bed and often a 3rd time during the day e.g. after coming home from the gym. Also put on clean underwear every time, obviously. I think not having a proper thorough bath/shower before going to bed is unhygienic: you would take all the day's dirt and germs to bed and they would fester there day after day... I like to go to sleeep in a clean bed with clean sheets.

[TimeWasting]

The key thing here though is that the OP was shocked that the SIL only showers once a week, which seems to me to imply that she wouldn't have guessed this and therefore the SIL doesn't smell.
Unfortunately as the OP has buggered off, we'll never know of this is the case.
I suspect it is.

When I worked in a shop a few years back there were a couple of customers who's smell made us sick in our mouths.
Showering once a week would have made a huge difference to their personal atmospheric impact I can assure you.

[FakePlasticTrees]

The thing is with the whole 'strip wash is just as good' crowd, well, i suppose it is for the bits you wash, but people don't just sweat in their armpit area, feet and bum n' bits area. watch men in shirts on the underground in the summer and there's normally wet patches on backs/chests as well - ok, when it's that bad you can see it through a shirt you know you need to wash there too (I hope!) but you will sweat a little bit through normal days in those places too.

Re not smelling yourself, I really can't smell myself at all today, but I know I put on sented deoderant and perfume (which, granted is not supposed to be a powerful sent) and I washed my hair with sented shampoo, so i must have a smell to others (which I hope is nice!). It's a bit like when I started using moroccan oil on my hair, the first two days I could smell it all day, but now that's just part of what the world smells like to me and I don't notice it. These people who don't wash all of themselves regularly must just think that's what the world smells like, rather than realising it's them...

[takeonboard]

I prefer to shower every day, I don't feel right otherwise, but I don't really mind what others do and don't feel they are dirty if they don't shower as often as me (unless they smell of course). My grandma used to strip wash and as I remember it took a lot longer than a shower, but probably saving water/money is the reason.
However I can't think of any child of any age who wouldn't be filthy if they only bathed/showered once a week.

[crazynanna]

I hate the smell when I am on the bus in the early morning,and there is a hum of someone who was pissed the night before,and it is mingled with the aroma of having tried to get rid of it by teeth brushing.
Booze and toothpaste....yuk

[expatinscotland]

LeQueen, you're screaming into the wind here. A lot of people think they don't smell so are happy to be unwashed.

[vmcd28]

Ho do you rise the soap off if you use a face cloth?

I feel absolutely manky if I dont have a shower and wash my hair every single day, so yes, I think SHE IBU.

[tallulah]

supadupa I agree

I can't bear strong perfume. There is a particular kind used by.. ahem, older ladies (no idea what it is) that actually makes me heave.

[supadupapupascupa]

lequeen if there is one thing i can't stand, it's other peoples strong perfume. If I can smell you before i see you IT'S TOO MUCH. Seriously, not a fan here, i hate it when colleagues use your phone and you can smell them afterwards....bleugh.

i prefer the smell of unperfumed, clean people, like we are meant to smell.

[somethingwitty82]

Once a week? aaaaah those were the days, I remember as a child once a week was the rule for everyone, and we would do our best to avoid it!

But then that was when your water was heated by a coal fire!

Perhaps they are of French heritage?

[southofthethames]

Oh dear OP - too much info! Does she smell, btw??

My anecdote isn't as shocking as yours but someone (won't say how she knows me to protect the innocent as well as the guilty) I know once came up to ask me for free medical advice...."Why do you think my son is scratching so much?"....after diligently asking all the right questions, she then comes up with the thing she should have told me when I asked her at the beginning: "I only let him bathe every 3 days in the summer because I thought all the excessive bathing would bring on eczema and aren't children quite clean anyway"......and there I was thinking her 8 year old DS only smelled because he'd been playing football all afternoon...didn't realise it was 3 day old sweat!!!! (she thinks her 8 year old is still a newborn, evidently.) This mum is a SAHM from a high income household and doesn't save water or money elsewhere, so the arguments for saving the planet and economising doesn't apply in their case. Had to gently explain that daily showering in a 32 degree heat summer in the southeast was the best option, esp when the scratching was making his eczema come back. Two weeks later, after following advice, scratching gone.

[tyler80]

Maybe these are the same women that i have to wait for the fug to pass after they've been in our kitchen at work, I don't know how they stand it, can hardly breathe if I go in at the same time as them! It's not a bad smell, just completely overpowering. A bit like going in Lush I imagine.

[tyler80]

"I know that within minutes of spraying myself with perfume I can no longer smell it on myself"

Really? The few occasions when I wear perfume in the daytime I end up trying to wash some of it off half way through the day because the constant smell makes me feel a bit sick!

[tralalala]

I shower most days, but the dcs only once or twice a week or else their ezcema flares up, also am too knackered with 3 under 5 on my own at bedtime.

[FridayFanjoFun]

My DC (little uns) bathe maybe twice a week (have a wash every day, though). They don't smell and are reasonably clean little things.

I shower daily, sometimes have a bath at night, too. DH, too.

I do believe, though, that from puberty onwards when body odours become more pungent, people should have a shower daily if possible.

p.s. Strip washes and using a face cloth on your arse must take longer than a shower, surely? Baffled.

[catgirl1976]

Nothing to do with me what other people do, but for myself I couldn't imagine leaving the house without having shower first.

[Cocoflower]

People can't smell themselves though as the become accustomed to their own scent.

Its like when you go on holiday and come back and say "oh so this is what our house smells like!"